BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — A business owned by the household of West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice is paying a $925,000 fine to an Alabama health company, after it shut down a coke plant it stated was dripping contaminating gases.
Under a permission decree authorized Wednesday by a state court judge, Bluestone Coke will pay the fine to the Jefferson County Health Department for air contamination offenses at its coking plant north of downtown Birmingham.
A coking plant warms coal at extremely high temperaturelevels in what are expected to be closed, oxygen-free ovens, cooking off pollutants while not burning the coal. The procedure develops coke, which is utilized as fuel to fire blast heatingsystems for metal and cement makers.
Coke ovens have long contaminated areas of Birmingham, assoonas a smoky center of coal mining and steelmaking and one of Alabama’s greatest cities. But increasing attention has focused on the effect of contamination in the primarily Black communities that surround Bluestone Coke and other commercial websites. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency hasactually designated the location a Superfund website and hasactually been excavating polluted soil for years. Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin hasactually prepared an unfunded $37 million strategy to buy out close-by homeowners and enhance the location.
The plant, which is more than a century old, hasactually been shut down consideringthat October2021 At that time, the health department decreased to restore its operating license after finding that the oven doors were dripping poisonous chemicals, as well as pointingout other upkeep failures. The firm tooklegalactionagainst for damages, calling the plant “a threat to public health.”
“There was a lot of ash and a lot of soot that individuals who lived near the plant stated would cover their vehicles and houses,” Pastor Thomas Wilder of neighboring Bethel Bachelor’sdegree